Friday, December 26, 2008

I participate in an online community that is ostensibly about baseball, but the most heated discussions there are about Dubya Bush and Proposition 8. The most vocal person on the right pointed us to this screed from the Mormon (Latter Day Saints) church on the latter issue.

This person claimed we "might be surprised" by what we see there, and he was right, I was. I could not believe how completely wackadoo their position is. Check it out for yourself, but I think I'm paraphrasing it fairly as follows:

"Although we consider homosexual behavior a sin, we do not hate gays. We do not even find it sinful that they experience homosexual urges. They are facing temptation from the devil, as we all do, and whether that temptation is being quick to anger or acting gayly, it is a virtuous person's goal to defeat sinful temptation. If a man can not muster attraction to women, then he should live a celibate life... suck it up and play the hand God dealt you."

Yeah that's right, you heard me. "Being gay = just not OK." I appreciated getting the link to some source here, because the guy we talk to is much much cagier than this. He'll go on and on about how he thinks he supports equality with regard to civil rights, just not marriage, but he skips right over points he can't win and never comes right out and says anything as blatantly condescending towards the gay failure of will as my paraphrase above.

So I just wanted to write down my take on that position, right while I'm quick to anger, as that's often when the main points are the clearest. If you are a member of a church, then that's your choice, and it is protected by our constitution. If your church wants to have rules on gay marriage, multiple wives, or extended bong hits, you go right ahead. Gopod knows I've seen too many people tortured by their own church, but at least it's their own choice to participate.

But where does your jurisdiction end? Right outside of your fucking church! In a constitutionally secular country like ours, your church should have no legal impact on anybody who chooses to reject it. Isn't that why you numb nuts came to America in the first place... to escape religious persecution? Nothing, not even your God, gives you the right to force your crap on anyone who doesn't want it!

It's time we separated church and state from the business of partnership once and for all. Let religion have "traditional marrage." Let them define it any way they want. Hell, I don't even care if different religions agree. But that definition should have no impact on America's laws. If you want the legal benefits accorded to "marriage" today, then straights, gays, omnisexuals, and polygamists have to answer to the same rules.

I'm even for instituting this retroactively. Pick a date in the future in which all marriages are legally null and void. Give everyone time to apply for the new credentials before that date hits. Heck, you should be able to do it online in ten minutes if you can supply some information about where your current legal documentation is on file.

The wackadoos are entitled to their own lives. But they should stay out of everyone else's. Hell, if Republicans understand that about money, surely they can grasp the concept when it rises to subjects that are indisputably more personal.

This is my first blog, and as such, I embrace no particular theme. I'll publish whatever comes out of me that I feel like putting out there.

"Nanda Parbat," in case you were wondering, is a DC Comics version of Shangri-La. "achiappanza" is a regional Italian word I learned while I lived there in 1994, but I don't tell people what it means. If you know, then let me know and we'll both have a laugh at the inside joke.